It has been nearly five months since I last had contact with another human, though I still see them every day. I can’t interact with them, I merely watch them in the plaza from my office perched 36 floors above. They don’t know I’m here, but I follow them with great interest as they gossip, laugh, enjoy the day, and drift through their lives. I watch them always, but I can never join them. My world is separate from theirs now.
I know what you are thinking, but I am not a captive or a prisoner. This isn’t some metaphor about the oppressive nature of today’s corporate culture. In fact I have no obligation to be in my office at all. I can leave whenever the mood strikes, pack up my belongings, turn my back on my windows and head beyond these walls.
I know what will greet me if I do leave and that is why I choose to stay. Beyond these walls is nothing but empty spaces where people should be. Regardless of the time of day or day of the week, if I enter the cubicle farm outside my office inside each cube will be family photos, personal nick-knacks, and empty chairs. I’ll never encounter another solitary soul.
If I continue that path I’ll eventually reach the bank of elevators situated in the 36th floor’s lobby. I can press the call button and soon enough the bell will chime to signal a car has arrived for me. In that elevator car I am guaranteed that there will never be another occupant. It will never deviate from my destination to stop at another floor, and its doors will never open until I reach the ground floor.
When I get to the ground floor lobby I will pass by a security desk that sits empty, alone in this space but for the reverberations of my footfalls as they echo off high ceilings. If I choose to I can place my hands on the push bar of the revolving doors, spin it 180 degrees and then walk beyond the building and into the plaza. That same plaza that only minutes before was a flurry of human activity - when viewed from the 36th floor - will now and forever sit in abandoned silence. If this was an old western film perhaps an errant tumbleweed would roll by, signifying the emptiness of the city laid out before me. But a scene like that cant exist when there is no wind to blow to blow the weed.
You see the people are not the only thing missing. The weather has vanished as well. There is no wind, rain, or snow. No warmth of the sun as it kisses your skin on a clear summer’s day. There is still daylight as well as night, but it is as if anything sensory has vanished from the world leaving nothing but a closed sound-stage waiting to be filled with actors. You would never imagine how much you can miss the rain or how void the world is without the sounds on the wind.
It still rains for you, I can see it from my window. Though if I head down the 36 flights to experience it for myself it will have vanished by the time I get there. Sure there are signs of the storm. The pavement will be wet and puddles will have formed. But air that should cling to your face with post storm humidity will instead be empty and stale. In the absence of sense all you feel is uncomfortable.
So you ask, how did this come to be? My final day of normalcy was in no way extraordinary. I imagine if I could pinpoint something peculiar that transpired it would make my predicament a bit easier to cope with. If that day had some great event that set everything that has happened since in motion I could at least find comfort in understanding the why of my situation.
As far as I can remember there was nothing odd at all. No chance encounter that morning. No angry homeless woman who cursed my lack of empathy when I refused to give her my spare change. No argument with my girlfriend where she in the heat of it all shouted after me some clichéd troupe like “with an attitude like that, you are going to find life very lonely.” There was no Act 1 cinematic moment to spark the beginning of my character’s story arc. It was just another Thursday.
In hindsight that day is of course unique. It will forever be the last time I kissed my girlfriend Katy. The last time I held her in my arms and had the lavender scent of her hair dance in my nostrils. The last time I ever stood on the train shoulder to shoulder with my fellow weekday warriors. The last time I shook someone’s hand, or heard someone’s voice, looked in someone else’s eyes and saw vibrant life within them.
It was all simple routine. Katy and I had breakfast together, though I was running late and had to eat in haste. My commute was uneventful, the train was delayed but that seems to always be the case when I’m already behind schedule. I got in the office later than I would have liked, but nobody seemed to notice or care. I went to lunch with Jarrod and we passed the time discussing some new Netflix series he thought I had to watch.
That entire day was completely normal right up until it wasn’t. In fact I can’t even pinpoint when things changed. I have replayed it in my head countless times, the benefit of solitude I suppose. I worked late that night and was the last to leave the office, but that was hardly unusual. I looked for Dennis the security guard to say goodnight as I passed his station in the buildings lobby, but when I didn’t see him I assumed he was making the rounds.
I headed outside into a calm clear night exhausted, and hardly even noticed that the sidewalk was empty. That the plaza, normally bustling with post work activity was for the first time I can recall, silent.
I was so far lost in my own thoughts that when I reached the subway platform and was waiting for the train it never struck me as odd that I waited in solitude. When the train pulled up and the automated recording said to “stand clear of the door” and to “let passengers exit the train before boarding.” I stood to the side to allow space for no bodies to pass by. Then satisfied that I had been properly courteous, I boarded the train and sat alone in an empty car.
I understand that when I tell it back that were plenty of red flags, multiple issues that I should have noticed that night. But there was simply just enough right in the world to cover over the terrible wrong. For starters I spent that entire ride home texting with Katy, and not just one-way texts sent from me into the void. Katy responded to every single one. Why would I suspect that I was no longer part of the world when I was still connected to it?
That at the very least is why I am able to tell this story to you. While I could never visit with you, or sit with you and have this conversation in person, when I hit submit you will be able to read everything.
I can’t see other people and they can’t see me. I can’t see the changes that they are making to a room we are both in, but if you change something the next time I enter that room I’ll notice. If I change something you’ll experience the result, and If I post online you will be able to see it.
This isn’t a theory, I have tested it extensively and know it holds true. I’ve swiped lunches from the shared refrigerator, taken photos off of desks, and even broken the law. I’ve committed a great many crimes in the world to verify that I’m not yet completely lost from it. Then I sit back and wait for it to be verified.
Every time, like clockwork a company wide email is sent out from HR about respecting personal property, the printer being down, or not taking food that wasn’t your from the refrigerator. The front page of the Newspaper will tell tales of house fires or bank robberies with no explanation of the cause. In those instances I know that my actions are behind it and it confirms for me that we are not as separated as I had first feared. Though being this close and yet still unable to correct this curse is infuriating.
The worst of it all is that the real world seems to have continued on without me. That is what I see from my office window, the world marching forward. I’m reminded of that with every text and every email that I receive.
In the beginning while I was still attempting to get a handle on my situation I took a stance that honesty would be best. At that point I still thought that there might be someone out there who could help me. I discovered quickly that while people have the ability to believe in a great many things, no one is willing to accept that you can’t be seen.
When I first told Katy she thought I was pulling a prank. The curse of the sarcastic jokester is that when you are in an extraordinary predicament nobody will believe you. Though I doubt even if I had a reputation as stalwart and honest I still would have found it impossible to find anyone who found my ramblings plausible.
What I got instead were people becoming increasingly agitated with me. My friends and family started asking where I was and why I was avoiding them. Katy began accusing me running off on her, of cheating on her. Inevitably without me being able to explain myself to her liking she left me and blocked my messages. Losing that lifeline back was nearly the end of me.
On top of everything I was even fired. Though that’s a meaningless loss in comparison. It’s only relevant in the sense that I guess I shouldn’t call this lone portal into the real world “my office” any more. None of the photos are mine. Kids that I will never meet drew the art that is pinned to the walls. With me being the only person here I don’t see the harm in claiming ownership for a little while longer.
Under normal circumstances I wouldn’t even have considered coming back here after being fired. Who continues to go into the office when its not required of them? But it’s my only access to reality. My only way of confirming that while I may be stuck beyond perception, the world is still there. That other people still exist and are still living lives worth living. The sights I see through the windows are enough to encourage me to continue on. To take the actions needed.
I have a plan. In brainstorming how I can rejoin everyone else and I have finally settled on a solution that I feel is most ingenious. The people are always visible through the window. The world sits there below and it is only when I turn my back on it and lose sight of the reality through the glass that disappears.
I can’t rejoin the world if I lose sight of it, but I could spend days in this office watching. So if the world remains through the window, all a person would need to do to enter it would be to break the glass, destroy the barrier. There is nobody here to stop me, though I do feel some pity for person who now shares my office with me. I hope they will understand it needed to be done.
Even with the glass broken I can’t simply climb down. Climbing would require me to look away and I know in that instant my contact with reality would be severed. I need to always see the people, it is the key to this whole thing.
So logically, as the ground rushes towards me I can’t close my eyes, I wouldn’t want to have them vanish and the jump be all for nothing. I’ll be back with you all soon.
Submitted August 05, 2017 at 11:51PM by DogBull_Rising http://ift.tt/2vAAHvL nosleep
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